Kataragama's Metaphysical Heritage

Kataragama Divya Rajottama

Kiri Vehera dates from the 2nd Cent. B.C.

By Patrick Harrigan

Sadkona Yantra

Of all the celebrated shrines to the youthful
god Skanda-Kumara or Murugan (Tamil: ‘tender one'), none enjoys a reputation
for sanctity and mystery like that of Kataragama (Sinhala; Kataragama), the jungle
shrine in remote southeastern Sri Lanka. To this day, an
inviolable curtain of secrecy surrounds the inscrutable activities of
Kataragama Skanda, whose Esala (July-August) festival is celebrated by
Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, and indigenous Vedar forest-dwellers
alike.

To scholars and devotees alike, Kataragama
occupies a hallowed place among the shrines of the ever-youthful patron god of
war, poetry, love, and mystery. Thanks in part to its isolation on the margins
of Sinhala. Tamil, and Muslim societies, Kataragama preserves
an ensemble of archaic beliefs and ritual practices, much of which date from
remote antiquity. As such, Kataragama is a veritable fountain of
information about timeless mysteries that were once common to all peoples
worldwide.

However, in keeping with the character of the
deity and the reputed functions of his shrine, most of this information is
either deliberately encrypted or concealed or otherwise confined to all but a
handful of ritual participants. This veil of secrecy, the existence of which the
hereditary custodians of Katirkama's traditions
readily concede, is further enhanced by a relative dearth of literature and
published findings by informed investigators. Indeed, modem interest has tended
to focus upon the sideshows of ‘Murugan's Circus', as one veteran observer has
aptly termed Kataragama, without ever identifying—let alone comprehending—
its ‘main attraction'.

From the perspective of informed participants
and practitioners (Skt. sadhaka)
on the other hand, it is clear that no scholarly study that overlooks the
shrine's soteriological or metaphysical dimensions can ever succeed in discovering its raison
d'etre. From this unanimous perspective, it is
through the mysterious workings of divine grace (Tamil: arul) alone
that doubts vanish and ‘meanings' become self-evident, and not through mere
speculation based upon imported assumptions. Hence, when many thousands of
devotees annually are able to access Kataragama's ample store of revealing
grace, there is little no reason why researchers, too, should not avail
themselves of this indispensable means to appreciate its mystery traditions.

Worship at Kataragama

The foremost feature of worship of the
Kataragama deity is that it is aniconic, i.e. without icons, idols, or images. To
His Tamil devotees, the deity is regarded as the Supreme

Identity (Tamil: kantazhi), which is explained as ‘reality
transcending all categories, without attachment, without form, standing alone
as the Self (naccinārkkiniyar). As such, only abstract symbols of His mystery (Skt: rahasya)
are worshipped, such as the vel and the sadkona
yantra (hexagram).

For uncounted centuries, the custodians of the Kataragama
shrine have conducted non-agamic, aniconic modes of worship including archaic
rites which, the tradition maintains, have come down
from the original inhabitants of prehistoric Lanka, the Veddas (Tamil: vedar). At Least
until, recently, the Sinhalese kapuralas (priests, who explicitly trace their
lineage back to the Veddas) still exercised their prerogative to hunt for deer
in Deviyange Kaele (Sinhala: 'God's Own Forest') and to make an
offering of the venison to the god on Saturdays. To this day, the Vedda or Wanniyal-aeto people of Lanka regard Kande
Yaka, ‘the Spirit of the Mountain', as their god of
the hunt who still extends guidance and protection to those who invoke Him. As
a reminder to all that the shrine and its traditions were originally theirs,
Veddas still attend the annual festival where they ritually ambush the god's
procession and extract tribute from the Sinhalese custodians of the shrine.

Local tradition maintains that King Duttugemunu
(2nd Cent. B.C.E.) established
(or, more likely, formalized and endowed an existing system of) rajakariya or ‘service to the king' whereby the prehistoric mystery rites were perpetuated in 505
hereditary roles incorporated into the annual fortnight-long festival in the
month of Esala (July-August). For centuries, the Esala festival has attracted
thousands of pilgrims who come from as far as Jaffna in the north or even
from India including, notably Saint Arunagirinathar (13th-14th Cent. C.E.), who composed at
least fourteen Tiruppukazh songs about Kataragama and
one about Tirukonamalai (Trincomalee) which is en
route. Until the nineteenth century, the pilgrimage used to attract
large numbers of Muslim faqirs from India as well, but today it
consists mainly of Tamil Hindu villagers from the East Coast.